Railway-car side door



Aug. 21, 1928. 1,681,822

A. E. SMALL RAILWAY CAR SIDE DOOR Filed Dec. 25, 1926 jz zvenior Il/L ur E. Sm all I gzforney la'tented Aug. 21, 1928.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

ARTHUR E. SMALL, OF CHICAGO, ILLINOIS, ASSIGNOR r RAILWAY METAL rnonoo'rs COMPANY, or CHICAGO, ILLINOIS, a CORPORATION OF DELAWARE.

RAILWAY-CAR SIDE noon.

Application filed December 23, 1926. Serial No. 156,706.

My device relates to a railway car having a door Opening in its side wall and a door arranged to move horizontally to close the door opening. Such a door may be supported upon the side sill by brackets with anti-friction rollers mounted therein, (as illustrated) I or it may be supported by suspension hangers engaging a track supported by the side plates adjacent the top of the door opening. The front vertical edge of the door is provided with a stiffener or frame member having a tongue or extension which engages a front door stop mounted on the front door post and the rear vertical edge of the door is provided with a stiflener or frame member having a tongue or extension which engages a rear locking strip mounted on the rear door post. These front and rear tongue engagements form weatherproof and burglarproof joints. The upper horizontal edge of the door is provided with a stiffener, frame member or a top interlocking strip (as shown in the drawings) and the bottom edge is pro vided with a frame member or perhaps a bottom track with a vertical depending lip behind the supporting bracket (as illustrated).

The front, rear, top and bottom stiifeners are secured together at the corners of the door to form a rectangular frame. It is common practice'to stiffen the four sides of a wooden door with such frame members and to stiffen the wooden door with battens, stiles and intermediate horizontal metal stiifening strips. but my device is an improvement thereon and contemplates the use of a relatively thin metallic plate rigidly secured to such a frame with integral horizontal, vertical or diagonal corrugations or embossments formed therein which transmit any loads or thrusts imposed thereon to the frame members. Boards or grain doors are sometimes nailed to the inside of the door posts to prevent the lading bearing against the door, but more frequently, particularly in package lading, the cargo bears against the door, and the impact of the car in service causes a wedging action between the cargo and the door. A side door is subjected to quite a few forces which have a tendency to distort the rectangularity of the door and cause buckling stresses in the door body plate. Such forces are caused by the door being moved suddenly to a closed position when either the upper corner or lower corner of the door strikes the front door stop before the other corner does. This condition is caused by the door opening being out of square. Such forces are also caused when the door suddenly hits the back door stop an eccentric blO'v The crow-bar when used to open a door is another source of trouble.

Considerable difficulty is experienced with warping of wooden doors and the fabrication of flat steel plates with metallic stiffeners is expensive and results in a very heavy door and even corrugated metallic doors have been proposed but they lack the strength and resiliency of my design.

The object of my device is to provide integral ribs or corrugations in a metallic plate when used as a side door for a railway car which transmit any stresses imposed thereon to frame members at the opposite edges of the metallic plate, which frame members, with other similar frame members, form a rectangular frame for the door. And a further object is to so form and shape such embossments or corrugations as to impart strength and rigidity to the plate adjacent the frame members of the door and to impart resiliency and flexibility to the plate adjacent the middle of the corrugations.

In the drawings:

, Fig. 1 is a fragmentary side elevation of a railway car equipped with a side door comprising my improvement.

Figs. 2 and 3 are sections on lines 22 and 3-3 respectively of Fig. 1.

Figs. 4 and 5 are sections on lines 4-4 and 55 respectively of Fig. 1 with the car parts omitted.

Figs. 6, 7 and 8 are sections similar to Figs. 3, 4 and 5 but show the major corrugations with an arcuate configuration.

Figs. 1 to 5 inclusive show the preferred form wherein the body plate of the door is provided with a plurality of parallel embossments, each embossment having its middle portion divided to form a plurality of sinuous minor corrugations 20 which are spaced apart distances equal to their respective widths and the portion 21 of the plate between adjacent minor corrugations is also sinuous so that these minor corrugations merge together to form a contiguous sinuous configuration symmetrical in cross section about a line midway between the outermost portions of these minor corrugations so that this line is the neutral axis of the section. Such a section is very resilient and has a spring like action under loads, and, furthermore, produces a Very strong section for the amount of metal used. A plurality of such minor corrugations 20 merge together adjacent the edges of the plates (or ends of the embossment comprising the minor and major corrugations) to form a lesser number of corrugations 22 with flat apices 23 which are spaced apart distances equal to their respective widths and the part 2st of the door be tween these major corrugations 22 is also flat, thus forming a configuration symmetrical in cross section about a line midway between the outermost portions of these major corrugations so that this line is the neutral axis of the section. Such a section is stronger and relative-1y rigid as compared with the section of the sinuous minor corrugations because more metal is positioned away from the neutral axis. The ends of the major corrugations merge into the plane of the plate by means of terminal portions 29 of any desired formation. By such an arrangement a corrugated metallic door is provided which is relatively rigid adjacent the end portions of the embossments and relatively resilient adjacent the middle portions of the embossments. The secondary oppositely projecting rib or corrugation 25 is equal in width to the adjacent minor corrugations at 26 and decrease in width as the minor corrugations merge together to form the major corrugation 22. These secondary oppositely projecting ribs 25 also preferably decrease in depth so that any concentrated stretch of metal is eliminated where the minor corrugations merge together.

Figs. 3,4 and 5 show the major corrugations 22 with flat apices 23 and the portions (24) of the plates between the major corrugations also being flat, Figs. 6, 7 and 8 are similar to Figs. 3, i and 5, respectively, and show the major corrugations with arcuate apices 2? and the portions of the plate (28) between the major corrugations also being arcuate.

The accompanying drawings illustrate the preferred form of the invention, though it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the exact details of construction shown and described, as it is obvious that various modifications thereof Within the scope of the claims will occur to persons skilled in the art.

I claim:

1. A horizontally movable side door for a railway car comprising a metallic plate secured to oppositely disposed frame members of the door, said plate provided with a plurality of corrugations merging into each other and into the plate adjacent said oppositely disposed frame members to form a plurality of fewer corrugations.

2. A horizontally movable side door for a railway car comprising a metallic plate secured to oppositely disposed frame members of the door, said plate provided with a plurality of corrugations merging into each other and into the plate adjacent said oppositely disposed frame members to form a plurality of fewer wider corrugations.

3. A horizontally movable side door for a railway car comprising a metallic plate secured to oppositely disposed frame members of the door, said plate provided with a plurality of corrugations spaced apart distances substantially equal to their width, said corrugations merging into each other and into theplatc adjacent said oppositely disposed frame members to form' a lesser number of corrugations spaced apart distances substantially equal to their width.

l. A horizontally movable side door for a railway car comprising a metallic plate secured to oppositely disposed frame members of the door, said plate provided with a plurality of corrugations symmetrical in cross section about a line midway between theoutermost portions of the corrugations merging into each other and into the plate adjacent said oppositely disposed frame members to form a lesser number of corrugations symmetrical in cross section about a line midway between the outermost. portions of the corrugations- 5. A horizontally movable side door for a railway car comprising a metallic plate secured to oppositely disposed frame members of the door, said plate provided with a plurality of contiguous sinuous corrugations merging into each other and into the plate adj aeent said oppositely disposedframe members to form a lesser number of corrugations with substantiallyflat apices. v

ARTHUR E. SMALL. 

